Asking For It, by Louise O'Neill, review

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"I am being ripped apart at the seams, my insides torn out until I am hollow," says Emma O’Donovan. When we first meet Emma, she is 18, full of life, and the most beautiful girl in Ballinatoom. By then end of Asking for It, she just wants to be erased, to fade away. This is because she has been brutally gang-raped and subsequently, when she goes public, subjected to an appalling campaign of vilification and humiliation. This is small town hypocrisy and sexism in the age of the smartphone.

Louise O'Neill, whose debut YA novel was the witty and unsettling Only Ever Yours, takes the brave step of making Emma a vain and somewhat unpleasant character at the beginning. That's the point. Rape is the issue, not a debate about any character flaws of the victim. It's hard not to wince when reading the novel. "Slut. Bitch. Skank. Whore. You were asking for it," people post on her Facebook page. Graphic pictures taken during the assault are posted. Twenty boys who were in her kindergarten class rate her naked, abused body. "I looked at the marks to see what they really thought of me, And I wished I was dead."

Author Louise O'Neill (right) with actress Eva Longoria at the New York launch party for Only Ever Yours in September 2015

The final 60 pages are powerful and distressing. We see the effects on her family life, as she weighs up whether to go through with a painful court case in a country where the rate of conviction for rape is only one per cent. She is depressed, full of guilt and having panic attacks. She doubts that her parents truly accept that it wasn't her fault. There is a heartbreaking moment when her mother witlessly refers to the rapists as being "good boys really, this just got out of hand". It's like a knife through Emma's heart. This is not an anti-man book, though. Two of the strongest, most sensitive, characters are t her friend Conor and her brother Bryan.

Asking for It is a brave and important book about rape culture, sexism and victim-blaming in modern society. Think for a moment, too, about this: it is estimated that around 85% of rapes are never even reported to the police in the first place. People should read Asking for It but be prepared for an ending that is as pitiful as it is honest.